


My Girlfriend Got Into Streaming

by PigeonStation



Category: Little Witch Academia
Genre: Akko becomes a streamer, Akko owns Diana with facts and logic, Angst with a Happy Ending, Comedy, Diana gets jealous of a hobby, Diana is EVEN WORSE at feelings, Diana is bad at technology, Established Relationship, F/F, Fluff, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, Jealousy, actually not sure if this is fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-20
Updated: 2021-01-20
Packaged: 2021-03-17 19:36:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,880
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28854438
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PigeonStation/pseuds/PigeonStation
Summary: When Akko convinced Diana to sneak her old laptop into Luna Nova, Diana thought nothing of it.Then, her girlfriend got into streaming.Was Diana jealous? Of a hobby?
Relationships: Diana Cavendish/Atsuko "Akko" Kagari
Comments: 30
Kudos: 188





	My Girlfriend Got Into Streaming

**Author's Note:**

> Had a fun idea for a story that I thought could work.
> 
> Enjoy!

For the most part, Diana was very grateful for what she had in life.

She had an adorable girlfriend who would shower her with love, love which she would ardently return. Diana’s relationships with her aunt and cousins were slowly, but surely, starting to take some form of civility, and dare she say, genuine familial respect. Her grades at Luna Nova were as flawless as ever, but academically, her real pride had been in seeing Akko’s steadily improving grades with regular tutoring sessions that she secretly counted as dates.

So why did Diana feel _jealous?_

Moreover, why was she jealous of an abstract concept?

No, Diana Cavendish wasn’t a jealous person. The only time in her life when she had felt any true semblance of jealousy was when she had found out that Akko had the Claiomh Solais, but even that had been very brief and faint.

It all started when Akko decided to pick up a new hobby.

* * *

“But Diana, you don’t understand!” Akko cried.

“Of course I understand,” Diana responded coolly, as she brought the teacup to her lips. “You want something, but that something is not permitted here at Luna Nova.”

“Diana, I get that you weren’t brought up around computers,” Akko said exasperatedly. “But from where I come from, everyone has a computer! I mean, if I could just bring back my old laptop with me from Japan, I’d feel less homesick…”

There. That was when Diana knew she had lost. The sad puppy eyes that Akko had perfected at some point after meeting her. _I guess I shouldn’t be quick to judge,_ Diana rationalised to herself. _After all, just because I feel comfortable away from home doesn’t mean everyone else feels the same way._

“Alright fine,” Diana sighed. “But _please_ don’t get yourself into trouble with it, dear.”

“Yatta! Yay! I love you so much Diana!”

Akko jumped into Diana’s arms—arms which had to strain to avoid spilling her tea. Diana couldn’t help but smile. She would never admit it, but Akko’s little idiosyncrasies were incredibly endearing to her, like a key to her ingrained self-composure.

“I love you, too.”

* * *

Since returning to Luna Nova from her visit back home, Akko had been like glue to Diana.

“Akko,” Hannah started, “we get that she’s your girlfriend and all, but it’s literally only been two weeks.”

“Yeah,” Barbara agreed, “and didn’t you force Diana to dig out her old Nokia just to call her at six every morning?”

“Hey, Diana said she liked it when I woke her up every morning,” Akko turned to Diana. “Right?”

Diana’s cheeks turned slightly crimson as she avoided the questioning eyes of her roommates.

“Urgh, you lovebirds can have the room to yourselves. Just leave a sock outside if you want us to knock when we get back.” Hannah and Barbara moved for the door.

“Why would you knock?” Akko asked, genuinely confused. “This is your room.”

Hannah stopped before the door and shot a disbelieving look at Akko, then, an “is she for real?” look at Diana, to which the latter struggled. Barbara dragged Hannah outside.

Diana eyed the bag that Akko had with her when she entered her dormitory. At some point during the week before, Akko had called her at three in the morning. This was surprising, since after the first time she had done so due to forgetting that the Earth rotates, she had apologised profusely—a Japanese thing, Diana assumed—afterwards and had sworn never to do so again. However, this time, Akko started by apologising first, and then had excitedly told Diana that she had something to show her after she gets back. In all honesty, Diana had scarcely registered the conversation as she had been barely conscious at the time.

“So Akko, what was it that you wanted to show me?”

“Oh yeah,” Akko’s eyes had suddenly lit up as a few neurons that had laid dormant since the previous week suddenly exploded with action—a reaction which Diana had grown accustomed to. “You’re gonna love this!”

She pulled out a red rectangular object out of her bag. On it were Shiny Chariot stickers… and was that a _unicorn?_ It was clear from the rough edges that it had been dropped a dozen or two times.

 _Adorable,_ Diana thought. “That’s a very beautiful plaque Akko. It must have taken much effort to make that.”

“What? No, Diana. This is my laptop!”

“Oh.”

“I’ve had this laptop since I was eight.” Akko traced a finger along the rough edges fondly, while Diana cringed as she prayed that her girlfriend wasn’t going to accidentally get a plastic cut. “It’s a bit banged up from, well, my ownership,” the brunette chuckled awkwardly while Diana gave her a flat look, “but I have so many memories with this.”

Akko gently opened her laptop. The screen flickered on, revealing—to nobody’s surprise—a Shiny Chariot wallpaper. Diana squinted her eyes at it, and thought it looked _slightly_ risque as the skirt seemed shorter than what she had in her memory. Diana was about to ask if Akko had drawn this herself when her girlfriend continued.

“For my tenth birthday, otousan bought me this cool Shiny Chariot game.”

Akko performed what was called a _double-click,_ which she explained was a technique to _execute programs,_ whatever that meant.

The screen then flickered to darkness, startling Diana. Akko, however, was transfixed on the screen. This wasn’t a side of Akko that Diana got to see often. The only other time Diana could recall seeing this side of her girlfriend was when she was being taught how to properly play the Shiny Chariot card game, something that she didn’t quite have the opportunity to learn as a child after her mother had passed away and with her unwillingness to become open about her interest.

Then, the screen came to life. A moving picture of Shiny Chariot appeared, along with her fanfare and Chariot saying “A believing heart is your magic!”

Diana was mildly impressed by the technology, which did not require any magic to function. It seemed that the non-magical world had figured out how to replicate the crystal ball without relying on a source of energy.

Akko proceeded to click— _not double-click?_ Diana wondered—a button with the text “Start Game”. Immediately, the screen had changed to what looked like a top-down view of a world made of tiny squares. Her girlfriend explained that it was like “Pokemon, except you fight monsters as Chariot,” whatever Pokemon meant.

As Akko started playing the game, Diana could start to see the appeal. It was a fun fantasy world for Chariot fans, something that ten-year-old—and seventeen-year-old—Akko could easily get lost in.

Around half an hour later, the screen suddenly blacked out.

“Ah crap,” Akko facepalmed. “I forgot to use the portable charger that Constanze made for me.”

Diana smirked to herself and mentally took back some of her earlier internal compliments of the technology.

* * *

Several weeks had passed since the start of the new semester. Diana had been a little worried that Akko might get too caught up in that game of her’s that her grades may slip, or that she would see Diana less. The blonde wasn’t sure which one was worse.

Thankfully, Diana’s worries were for naught. She felt almost guilty for not giving her girlfriend enough credit, and when she had confessed this, Akko laughed and told her that she would get along great with okaasan, something which secretly made Diana a little happier.

Akko had gotten Constanze to connect her to the _internet,_ which Diana vaguely understands as like a network of ley lines, but for non-magical information. She had been impressed by the amount of information one could access with the internet, but all Akko seemed to be interested in was watching old Shiny Chariot performances and cat videos.

Although a difficult task, Akko managed to get Diana to admit that she enjoyed watching both of them with her.

More recently, Akko seemed to have caught onto a concept called _streaming,_ short for _live streaming._ According to her, it was an activity where someone would broadcast themselves to hundreds, or even thousands of other people in real-time. Diana didn’t really see the appeal, and neither did Akko initially, but she explained that it was something that really took off during the previous year in which she didn’t have access to the internet.

Naturally, after finding out that some streamers played the Shiny Chariot game, Akko’s attention was glued to their streams for an entire Saturday afternoon.

“What?! Why did they use the Shiny Arc on the dragon alone?” Akko exasperated. “They should’ve circled around the arena and aligned the monsters first!”

“Akko dear,” Diana sighed as she put down her textbook. “Why are you watching them if you can just play the game yourself without getting frustrated?”

“But I’ve beaten the game a dozen times! It’s boring to play it on my own, and at least with this I can watch other people who like the game.”

“Other people who don’t play the game in the way you would?”

Akko’s gears started turning. Diana watched in mild amusement as the brunette began biting her tongue, something that she had seen her do countless times during their tutoring sessions and exams.

“Wait—Diana,” Akko exclaimed as she looked wide-eyed at the blonde. “That’s it!”

“Um, Akko dear,” Diana gave her a questioning look. “You’re going to have to be more specific.”

“I’m gonna be a _streamer!_ ”

_Oh dear._

* * *

“Welcome to Shiny Akko’s stream!” Akko—or _shinyXakko_ —announced on the stream.

“She really is doing this, isn’t she?” Diana asked, as she looked over Constanze’s shoulder onto the monitor.

Constanze grunted in affirmation while watching with a strangely earnest fascination.

“Do you think she will get many viewers?” Diana asked, mostly due to feeling a little out of place.

Constanze lazily signed with her hands.

“Hm.” Diana nodded, without having the slightest idea what the shorter girl meant. Maybe she should pick up German sign language some time.

They were in Constanze’s lab, which Diana wasn’t really sure how to feel about, since the teachers still hadn’t caught onto the German girl’s secret.

Akko was in a small room—no bigger than a broom closet—adjacent to where they were, that Constanze dug up for her on a whim when she had asked. It seemed Akko had earned the respect of the quiet girl, not totally unlike the way Akko had earned Diana’s respect, and more.

The stream had started with a viewer count of a measly three. However, when Diana had looked up from her notes half an hour later, shinyXakko’s viewer count grew to a little over twenty. She was surprised, and glancing at the chat, it seemed like the viewers were amazed by Akko’s display of skill in the Shiny Chariot game.

Or, at least, that was how Diana interpreted the strange tiny pictures appearing in the chat.

* * *

Shortly after Akko started streaming, she started doing so regularly. Initially, two times a week, and soon, to four.

This wasn’t much of an issue at first, as Diana’s assistance with Akko’s scheduling meant that the brunette’s workload would never pile up and accumulate, so slotting in a couple of sessions of streaming a week was doable.

However, as Akko’s interest in streaming grew, she had to redirect a bit of time away from her friends, and Diana too. Their friends were curious, but ultimately didn’t mind Akko spending time on her newfound hobby. Although to be honest, they weren’t too interested as they were neither Shiny Chariot fans, nor had a device to watch Akko with.

Diana didn’t really begrudge Akko for spending a few hours a week away from her. After all, her girlfriend was having fun, while she gets some extra time to dedicate to studying or research, so it was kind of a win-win situation.

Akko’s streams had more viewers than ever. In the initial weeks, she would get dozens of viewers due to her skill alone. In fact, she was so familiar with the game that she even tried _speedrunning,_ whatever that meant. Eventually, some viewers recognised her through her budget laptop webcam as one of the girls who had saved the world from the Noir Missile. This netted her swarms of viewers as a minor celebrity.

The brunette, however, didn’t really care about much of that. She was pleasantly surprised that thousands of people wanted to know about her, but she wasn’t streaming for a celebrity status. So eventually, her viewership stabilised at triple-digits. Her buoyant and vibrant personality no doubt made her streams unique, and to Diana, it was proof that Akko will one day achieve her dream career as a performer.

Akko was slightly overwhelmed when people wanted to donate to her to show their support for her streams. She was flattered, and felt encouraged to keep up with the hobby, but as an unread Marxist at heart, she wasn’t interested in money, and instead set up a donation link to a charity for protecting aquatic ecosystems.

Diana was happy for Akko.

So why did she feel this gnawing feeling in her gut?

* * *

The sour feeling in Diana’s stomach wasn’t going away. She was even starting to feel some _guilt_ when spending time with Akko, which in turn led to more guilt.

Lying on her bed, one night, tired but without the desire to sleep, Diana rummaged through her brain.

Why couldn’t she feel completely happy with Akko’s new hobby? Since everyone else in this scenario was content, and Diana hadn’t been wronged in any way, the logical part of her brain deduced that this must be jealousy.

But she wasn’t jealous of Akko. Why would she be? Akko’s success as a small-time streamer was well-earned, and a perfect demonstration of her determination and the well-placed confidence that Diana had in Akko.

No. She was jealous of her viewers. She was jealous of the people who interacted with Akko during her streams, who appreciated the game on a level that Diana could not, who understood internet culture that Diana wilfully abstained from all her life, who Akko talked to in a way that she could not do so with Diana, who understood Akko in a way that Diana could not.

This was a part of Akko that Diana simply did not have access to. The perfectionist part of Diana wanted to fulfill Akko in any and every way possible. Because Diana loved her. Because Diana must meet the expectation of perfection.

And because the very concept of streaming was something that could fulfill Akko in a way that she could not, she was, in fact, jealous of an abstract concept.

 _Am I really this clingy?_ Diana asked herself. She was always keeping people at a distance, but for once she wanted to be completely and utterly bound to Atsuko Kagari, the girl that had persisted at her inner walls by simply being there, by simply being herself.

Was this feeling a defense mechanism? Something that had evolved out of being starved of affection since her mother had passed? No, scratch that—she didn’t want to know the answer. _I feel pathetic,_ Diana chuckled mirthlessly, with moisture in her eyes.

Her tumultuous mind eventually gave way to exhaustion, and Diana had fallen asleep in the early hours of the morning.

* * *

Distance.

It was subtle at first, at least enough for Akko to excuse it to be simply the finiteness of the number of hours in a day.

After all, Akko was ecstatic with her newfound hobby, as with it she had found a niche community of people who shared a commonality with her, who enjoyed tuning into her streams as much as she enjoyed streaming.

Of course, this meant Akko had to slightly ration her time with respect to the other activities she would partake in a day. She had no qualms about giving her friends a little more time to themselves, as despite what some people might think of her, Akko was no fool. She knew that she could be a bit too much to handle sometimes, as in the blink of an eye her excitement could leap great lengths for things she cared deeply about.

So giving her friends a little more quiet time in their day was something she was happy to do. What she didn’t want, however, was to take away from the time she would spend with her girlfriend.

Her relationship with Diana was something that she wouldn’t trade the world for. Her feelings for the blonde had snuck up on her like a viper in the dead of the night, constricting her until she could do nothing but to confess her feelings to her crush. She did this in what some would say is the least romantic way possible; by walking out of her bed, dressed in nothing but her usual unremarkable sleepwear and seeking out Diana during her nightly patrol.

It had felt like desperation, the culmination of many months of being _dear friends_ with Diana. Akko had felt like unless she confessed right there and then, she would burst. And so she hastily did, and Diana, who had stared wide-eyed at Akko, with her mouth half-open in surprise, had started shivering once she realised that Akko was confessing, and returned her own in barely contained eagerness and relief.

Since that night, Akko and Diana had been inseparable. So it was to Akko’s surprise when Diana had been the first to suggest that she would happily give Akko more time to get acquainted with her new hobby.

Akko had felt like she was nearly overwhelmed with affection for Diana, because the blonde had shown her support for Akko’s endeavour despite not understanding very much of it.

But gradually, Diana had seemed more distant. Whereas before, almost daily, if Akko wasn’t quick enough, Diana would be the one to ask if Akko wanted to spend time with her at some later point during the day. Now, it seemed that Diana rarely ever asked. And even when Akko asked, the blonde would often respond with “Are you sure you wouldn’t rather stream instead?” Akko wouldn’t exactly describe her tone as cold, but rather it was in some way half-hearted, like Diana had expected Akko to take the opening and spend time away from her. The blonde had even seemed distant during their tutoring sessions, as if roleplaying a fact-regurgitating Stanbot.

Akko was perplexed. Of course, she enjoyed streaming, but why would she choose between that and her girlfriend?

She didn’t want to push Diana, however. Because she trusted Diana. Because surely, Diana will come to her when the time is right.

* * *

Akko _really_ wanted to push Diana.

No, not just metaphorically, but to _actually_ push her up against a wall and demand they talk out… whatever this weird chasm was.

It had been a few weeks since Akko had really felt this funk that they were in.

_Funk._

Akko giggled. What a funny word; a word that has _fun_ in it, and one letter off from _funky,_ which is also fun, but from experience, funk was most definitely not fu—

“Miss Kagari!” Professor Finnelan suddenly shouted from behind the podium, staring daggers at Akko. In her surprise, there was a thump that reverberated across the lecture room as Akko jumped and hit her knee.

She concentrated very hard not to make a weird face at the older witch as she withstood the earth-shattering pain. For her efforts, she earned a look of mild amusement from Sucy, sitting next to her.

“Would you care to share with the class what you find to be so funny with the inconsistencies of magical incantation with the Chomsky hierarchy?”

“Uh, w-well,” Akko stammered.

“You know what? Nevermind.” Professor Finnelan sighed in a surprisingly defeated manner. “I don’t even want to know. If you disrupt the class one more time, you’re on dish duties for a week, am I understood?”

Akko nodded enthusiastically and quickly sat down. _Phew, that was close,_ Akko thought, she let out a relieved sigh. In the spur of the moment, her brain came up with a throwaway line about Noam Chomsky and gnomes, which would have surely netted her on Finnelan’s shitlist for the rest of the year if she had been allowed to continue.

Akko’s gaze instinctually fell on blonde and tea-green hair as she tried to relax, and noticed that Diana’s shoulders were a little tense. A little troubled.

Had Diana been worried about her? Could Akko simply ask her afterwards? Akko furrowed her eyebrows. Why did she feel this hesitation in approaching Diana anyway? It felt _wrong._

Being in a relationship with the Cavendish meant that you learnt to read clues as to how she’s feeling based on details about her that were near imperceptible to the untrained eye. Diana had complimented Akko on her uncanniness for it way back, but what is the value of a skill that isn’t exercised towards something good?

Akko was a doing-person after all, and it was clear to her that the lack of _doing_ from either of them had done nothing to solve the problem.

* * *

After the class had ended, Akko quickly made her way to Diana.

“Diana,” Akko began, “are you busy right now?”

“Akko?” Diana turned around, slightly startled. She looked down briefly, which Akko didn’t miss, before meeting her eyes. “I’m not particularly busy, no. Was there something you needed?”

Akko almost faltered. It was almost as if the weeks of distance had culminated into a wintry breeze that took the air from her lungs.

But Akko didn’t let go. _If anything,_ she thought, _this is proof that we really need to talk._ “Not really, but can we talk?”

Diana’s eyes widened slightly, as if dreading something. “Y-yes, of course. My dormitory, then?”

Hannah and Barbara, who were waiting for Diana near the exit, looked at eachother. Like psychics, they both wordlessly agreed that whatever Diana and Akko needed to discuss demanded privacy, and was also probably long overdue.

“Um,” Barbara started, “Hannah and I are going to… frolic with Avery.”

As they walked towards the direction of Avery’s dorm, Hannah gave her best friend a weird look.

“Frolic? Really?” Hannah said in a hushed voice while shaking her head. Barbara only blushed and walked faster.

The walk to the blue team’s dorm was tense, quiet. A far cry from the comfortable silence that used to surround Diana and Akko as they walked the halls of Luna Nova hand in hand.

Diana closed the door behind them. Instead of heading to a seat near the small table, she strode to her tea set.

Akko understood that Diana was nervous and was therefore stalling the inevitable. Honestly, it couldn’t have been made any more obvious by the fact that Diana was actually boiling the kettle rather than directly using a heating spell, as a young woman who took her time seriously normally would.

Akko, however, found this to be strangely endearing. She took a seat and indulged herself in watching Diana work.

After a couple of minutes, Diana poured them tea and sat down.

“So,” Diana began asking, having clearly steeled herself somewhat with her ritual. “What was it that you wanted to talk about, Akko?”

“Diana, I feel lik— _ow!_ ” Akko accidentally burnt her tongue. She placed the cup down. “I feel like _you_ should tell _me._ ”

Diana looked uncomfortable. And not from having witnessed Akko burn her tongue, which actually had soothed her somewhat. Not that she was a sadist, but Akko being Akko never ceased to brighten her day, regardless of whether she wanted it. “What do you mean?”

“C’mon Diana. We both know that we’ve been in a… _funk_ for a while now.” Akko waved her arms like a madwoman to emphasize her point, as if the more ridiculously she did it, the clearer her point would be. “You don’t ask to hang out with me as often as you used to. We haven’t hugged in like _forever!_ When you study now you never don’t ask me to be near you. You don’t smile as much anymore, well, I mean not as much as after we started getting along last year. The few times we kissed we didn’t even use tong—”

“Akko, stop. Please.” Diana clutched onto her teacup like a lifeline. “I… I know. I’m sorry.”

_I’m sorry._

_Did Diana just apologise?_ Akko cocked her head. “Diana?”

“I know I’ve been… rather distant lately,” Diana said quietly, finding her teacup particularly interesting for some reason. “It’s been obvious, and I know you’ve noticed. I couldn’t help it, but that’s no excuse. I should have taken responsibility for it.”

“What do you mean?” Akko asked, about as confused as she would be in a magical linguistics lecture. “Taking responsibility for what?”

In Akko’s ever-straying mind, her first thought was pregnancy. Like, when couples talked about responsibility, it was always about the birds and the bees, right?

Well, at least the pause in which Diana seemed to brace herself was pregnant.

“Ever since you got into streaming, I… could not truly feel happy for you.” Diana was fidgeting with the hem of her skirt. “Please believe me, I wanted to, Akko. But I felt jealous that streaming brought you a sense of happiness and belonging that I cannot. I felt… inadequate.”

Akko could see the glistening in Diana’s eyes, tugging at her heart to do something, anything to comfort her. She reached out for Diana’s hand—

“Please, Akko,” Diana raised her hand, meeting red eyes that yearned for a chance at reassurance. Diana wasn’t ready. Not yet. “Allow me to finish. I need to push through this. I need to come to terms with the uncomfortable, but indisputable reality that I am a… a…”

 _a…?_ Akko held her breath. In the silence that ensued, Akko could swear she heard the blood rushing in her ears. What followed was a voice so quiet that Akko could have mistaken it for a mouse squeak.

“... a _bad_ girlfriend.”

Akko gaped. “A— _what?_ ”

Diana, through her moistened eyes, gave the brunette a “really?” look. She sighed and repeated—slightly louder than a mouse squeak but Akko had to strain nonetheless—“A bad girlfriend.”

Akko was bewildered. Now, she wasn’t the brightest student, but through her upbringing in her working class family in Kyoto, she had common sense.

Okay, maybe not common sense in a way that most people would recognise, but the kind of common sense that let her see the forest beyond the trees, the light at the end of a long tunnel without feeling lost, the silver lining behind clouds so dark and thick that would have driven most people to capitulate and return home.

And so she saw the contradiction that the Cavendish _couldn’t._ That the blonde wanted to be someone impossible—someone who could understand and accommodate the brunette in every way possible. And when Diana inevitably fell short of the ever unreachable ideal, she felt like she was at fault.

While Akko could not understand completely, she still empathised. After all, having been told that you are either perfect or must thrive for perfection for one’s entire life, it was almost surprising that Diana’s sanity was intact as it was. And being starved of genuine human attention, affection, and love, and finally having finally found an oasis in Akko, Diana’s perfectionism must have been in overdrive.

Akko smiled. Not a smile of amusement, or of pity, but a genuine beam that communicated her love for Diana. Her love for her endless beauty, her impossible depth, her imperfections and contradictions, her very human complications, for the very essence of the person that was sitting in front of her, anxious and confused.

“I love you.”

* * *

“I love you.”

Diana blinked. After her painful admission of being a… _a bad girlfriend,_ there had been a pause that finally made the butterflies in her stomach riot with pitchforks and torches. Diana’s mind had felt like it was in freefall. Nevermind her poor sleeping as of late, she had felt a minor headache and dizziness from the _very real_ possibility that the brunette was going to want to break up with her. _I would deserve it,_ she gravely thought. _Why couldn’t I have simply been happy for her?_ She squeezed her eyes shut.

So imagine the blonde’s shock when she heard Akko declare in a soft, unwavering voice that she loved her, and through vision that was blurred by unshed tears, saw that the brunette wore a beaming smile that she internally swore could accelerate global warming.

Did Akko mishear her? No wait, that’s it. _Oh dear, I’ve finally lost it,_ Diana thought, _my poor sleeping as of late in conjunction with my awful emotional state has placed me in this psychosis, likely constructed to protect the remnants of my sanity._ And then her mind wondered a little further than intended. _Perhaps I should just take a break and enjoy this while I can…_

Diana shook her head violently.

“Diana?” Akko looked at her curiously with a slight hint of worry.

“Yes, Akko?”

“You know I just said ‘I love you’, right?”

“Yes.”

“So…?”

“Hm.” Diana held her chin, as if in deep thought. She wasn’t—she just didn’t know what to do with her hands. “Would you care to explain?”

“Uh, the meaning of love?” Akko was perplexed, but hell, she’d be happy to try—and fail—at verbally capturing what love means if it meant helping Diana.

“No, as in why did you say ‘I love you’ after I confessed that I am a… _a bad girlfriend?_ ”

“Oh. Well Diana, you’re really _not._ ” Akko shrugged, casually. Too casually, maybe, since Diana blinked. “Like sure, you should’ve talked to me earlier about how you were feeling, but I think I get where you’re coming from.”

“I know that,” Akko continued before Diana could speak, “you love me, and care about me. If every plane in the world blew up and I was stuck in Japan, you’d fly to the other side of the world on your broom just to be with me. Am I right?”

Diana nodded slowly, not entirely sure where the brunette was going with this.

“I’d do the same for you. Well, I’m not good enough at flying for that last part, but you know I’d practice day and night until I’d eventually be able to do it, right?”

The blonde nodded again without hesitation. Akko’s indomitable will was _no joke._

“Right! And just based on that, am _I_ a bad girlfriend, Diana?” Akko pointed at her nose.

Diana shook her head. _Of course n_ —oh.

_Oh._

Akko must have seen the look of realisation on her girlfriend's face, because the brunette wore a haughty look that could almost rival Hannah.

“What about if I can’t hold a conversation with you about medical stuff,” she continued. “Am I now a bad girlfriend, Diana?”

“N-no...” Diana sunk into her chair. She felt silly. It was strangely reminiscent of the times her mother would reason with her as a child, something that Diana didn’t expect to experience ever again.

Akko was right. Albeit unprecedented, she had successfully outreasoned Diana with sound logic. Was Diana rubbing off on Akko? No, that’s silly, Akko deserves far more credit than that. There was something about Akko’s unapologetic optimism that allowed her to understand emotions in a way that someone like Diana had trouble with. Diana really did admire her girlfriend.

No, Diana wasn’t a bad girlfriend. Of course she wasn’t going to complete Akko in every way possible. Akko wasn’t an exam where every response had to be perfect to attain the highest mark. She wasn’t a long list of checkboxes waiting to be ticked. She was her own person, with depths that Diana could plunge into and still never reach the end. Her expectation was impossible. Utterly unattainable. She doesn’t expect perfection from Akko, so why should she expect the same from herself? Akko had long since stopped being her rival—not that it was something that Diana acknowledged at all in the first place. They were equals, two halves in this relationship with identical weight.

Bright blue met deep red halfway in an ocean of space, in a world for two.

Diana held Akko’s welcoming gaze with an intensity that she conjured with barely any effort, in spite of her restless state as of late. It wasn’t an apology. It was an understanding. A declaration. A mutual acknowledgement.

More importantly, it was a promise.

Their lips met in a kiss that seemed to communicate infinitely many words in an all too finite moment.

And when they broke apart, Diana finished what Akko had started.

“I love you, _Atsuko._ ”

* * *

Diana was enjoying a novel with a cup of tea on a relaxed Sunday afternoon when she heard familiar footsteps outside her dormitory. She smiled to herself.

“Come in, Akko.” Diana announced before Akko could knock. At this point, the brunette didn’t even look surprised anymore as she walked in. “How was your stream, dear?”

“It was good,” Akko said as she made herself comfortable on her girlfriend’s lap. “Chat was suggesting new emotes, and someone had a design where it was Shiny Chariot, but me!”

“That sounds lovely.”

“Yeah, but you won’t believe this,” Akko giggled. “Someone suggested that I should make a minigame where every time I say ‘A believing heart is my magic!’ on stream, the first person to type a command or something gets a bunch of AkkoCoins!”

This was it. Diana’s opportunity. She took a deep breath as her heart beat faster.

“That’s,” Diana started, “colon, L-U-L, colon.”

Akko blinked. She stared at her girlfriend quizzically. “Uh, Diana, you know you don’t have to say the _colon,_ right?”

Diana paused, and thought deeply to herself, as if she was a child trying to remember their times tables.

“ _Kappa._ ”

There was a silence. Then, Akko broke down.

Laughing, of course.

Diana was not entirely sure if this was the reaction she was hoping for.

After Akko settled down and wiped the corners of her eyes, she asked, “ _Oh Diana,_ that was intentional right?”

“Maybe.” It wasn’t. Her patented Cavendish poker face was her saving grace.

After she poured a cup of tea for Akko, she walked to her corner of the dormitory that was obstructed by the bookshelf.

“Diana?” Akko questioned in between blowing her tea.

A moment later, the blonde emerged from behind the bookshelf, carrying a rectangular device in her arms.

Akko’s eyes widened as she nearly dropped her tea. “Is that a laptop!?”

“I wanted to be able to watch your streams from the comfort of my dormitory,” Diana responded, “so I asked Constanze if she had a spare laptop that I could borrow for the time being.”

“Ah—I’m so happy!” Akko beamed. She gave her girlfriend a quick peck on her lips. “Turn it on, Diana!”

“Gladly.”

Diana moved to switch on the laptop with the confidence and elegance of a British aristocrat.

Nothing.

“Diana,” Akko began slowly, ignoring the teacup that fell from her hands, “did you just try to turn it on by _double-clicking?_ ”

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it!
> 
> This is my first ever fanfic (or fiction of any kind, really), so any comments would be greatly appreciated! (Formatting on AO3 is really something else, huh?)


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